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CHAP.
XLIII.

Saxons deserted them, animated the French with desperation. Napoleon took advantage of it to fill up the gap left by the Saxons, and check the advance of Bernadotte upon Reudnitz. But although successful in this, as well as in checking Schwarzenberg, who, after divers assaults, had relaxed his efforts into a distant cannonading, his enemy was still unbroken, whilst the loss of 30,000 men a side was far more wasting to the French than to the allies. At sunset, therefore, Napoleon withdrew into Leipzig, and gave orders for the retreat. This was effected without much interruption from the enemy, until many hours had elapsed, allowing full time for the French to have evacuated Leipzig, had sufficient bridges been prepared over the Elster. There was but one, however, which greatly retarded the passage, and it being prematurely blocked up by a panic, left a large rear guard and a host of camp followers to the mercy of the victorious enemy.

The pursuit of the retreating French was by no means active or distressing. The Austrians alone lost 30,000 men, the Russians and Prussians more. Considerably more than 100,000 men fell in the battles of Leipzig. Napoleon tarried some days at Erfurt to recruit and recollect the shattered remains of his army. Thence pursuing his retreat, he found the Bavarian army, under De Wrede, drawn up at Hanau to intercept him. The French were scarcely one-third of the Bavarian force, which had so lately fought by their side, and whose king had at every peace profited by the victories of Napoleon. To Bavaria, indeed, had been given most of the provinces taken from Austria, the great cause of its discontent and present animosity. The conduct of Bavaria and of its commander, De Wrede, was ignominious. "I made De Wrede a Count," said Napoleon, "but could not make him a general." The French with ease walked over the 60,000 Bavarians, and, putting them to rout and flight, crossed the Rhine to Mayence. It is impossible to read

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of the conduct of Saxon and Bavarian in those days, CHAP. brave soldiers, but transferring their allegiance and their courage now to this side, now to that, without severely condemning the useless partition of Germany into a multitude of principalities, ever betraying the interests and honour of their populations. And it is one of the happiest results of our own day (1866), that such a partitionment of sovereignty, under all its absurd and pernicious consequences, should have been put an end to.

The retreat of the French behind the Rhine suggested the time as fit for negotiations. Austria, jealous of the Czar and his abettal of Prussia, and of Bernadotte, was anxious for them, and sent to propose an exchange of prisoners when Napoleon was at Erfurt. Later, M. de St. Aignan, a captured French diplomatist, was sent back (on the 10th of November), with offers to France of the Rhine, the Alps, and the Pyrenees as frontiers. Before his departure he received from Lord Aberdeen the assurance that England did not desire to humiliate France, but that in giving to its empire the frontier of the Rhine, it would seek to preclude any domination, or impose any influence, beyond that barrier. An immediate and frank acceptance of this offer would have established Napoleon firmly on his throne. Instead of this, although St. Aignan reached him on the 14th, it was not till the 26th that an answer was received from the Duke of Bassano, accepting Mannheim as the place of negotiation, but not accepting the basis or the frontier laid down. Although St. Aignan repeated that Austria and England were both favourable to peace, the French reply was framed expressly against England, and insisted that if France left the other nations of continental Europe independent, England must do the same by maritime powers, and abandon her influence and conquests on the sea and its coasts. Nothing could be more fair between rival and rival, each in the plenitude of power. But Napoleon had been

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defeated in Germany and in Spain. The English minister was foremost to abet the policy of treating France generously, and yet in his reply it was particularly against England that Napoleon showed his animosity.

Nothing could be more ill-judged. Napoleon's answer plainly proved to the English Government that, however forbearing or generous their policy, it would find no corresponding policy in him, and would not modify in the least his old inveteracy to England. The consequence was, that the British Cabinet came to consider Lord Aberdeen as too mild a negotiator, and too favourable to France, and that it was necessary to correct that tendency, first by a change in his instructions, and then by the presence of the minister himself, Lord Castlereagh. The reply of Napoleon being considered evasive, the allies turned their whole attention to an immediate invasion of France, the Austrians by Basle, the Prussians and Russians between Mayence and Strasburg. The English Government at the same time relapsed into more hostile sentiments; Lord Wellington, defeating Soult on the Nivelle, established himself in front of Bayonne. Whilst the return of Holland under the dominion of the House of Orange, left the troops of Bernadotte free to invade the Belgian provinces.

The French, detested in the countries they had oppressed, were nowhere so thoroughly so as in maritime ones like Holland. And a foe to France had but to appear in any strength in order to make the Dutch rise and expel French governors, soldiers and douaniers. By unanimous acclamation the House of Orange was restored to its supremacy. It then occurred to the English Government, that so propitious a revolution ought not to stop at the Rhine. To free the Scheldt from French domination, and make Antwerp cease to be a hostile arsenal and a menace to England, was a national object. And as a marriage between the Prince of Orange and the heiress to the English throne

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was then in contemplation, to make him sovereign of CHAP. the Scheldt, as well as of the Texel, was a feasible and well-imagined scheme. When this idea got possession of the English mind, the abettal of Lord Aberdeen's views, that of allowing to France the frontier of the Rhine, became impossible. And in the council of the allies, England, instead of adopting and seconding Metternich's ideas, leaned more decidedly to the Russian.

Whilst Napoleon was thus awakening English enmity to him and higgling with the proffers of Austria, instead of accepting them frankly, he had scarcely 60,000 men to oppose to the 300,000 which poured over the Rhine in the first days of 1814; the Austrians at Basle, Blücher lower down the river. The former advanced by the opening of Béfort through the Vosges, the latter crossed the hills into Champagne. Napoleon had not expected their immediate advance, nor was he prepared for the pressure of a winter campaign. Despondency or surprise, however, did not relax his efforts. And yet he cannot be said to have made those which might best have saved him. Had the population of France unanimously risen in his favour, and displayed anything like the enthusiasm of 1793, the allies, several of whom hesitated and shrank from a march on Paris, would have been deterred. But Napoleon knew not how to address a free people. He, indeed, called the Legislative Body together, and laid before them his necessities and his prospects. Although they did not refuse to aid him, still their first impulse was to criticise his acts, and blame the obstinacy which had impelled him to reject all offers of peace. Even on this point he gave them but partial information. He shunned publicity as much as freedom. The Assembly, therefore, showed more signs of discontent than adhesion. And the Emperor, instead of using his Legislature as a medium to address and appeal to his people, convened them merely to scold and dismiss them.

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The Emperor's reliance was solely upon force. Yet he did not take decisive steps to rally even that which he possessed. Had he, during the armistice in Germany, recalled his garrisons from Dantzic, and the other towns on the Vistula and Oder, he might have fought a much more successful battle at Leipzig. Could he now obtain succour from Murat and from Eugène in Italy, from Suchet and Soult in Spain, he would be at the head of a formidable army. Murat, however, was alienated from Napoleon, and prepared to attack, not second, Eugène in North Italy, on the condition of his kingdom being secured to him by Austria. To embarrass him, and to wipe away the greatest outrage on the Catholic world, Napoleon allowed the Pope to leave Fontainebleau and recross the Alps to Italy. He had sought to provide for the return of his Spanish army by negotiations with Ferdinand at Valençay. But the Spanish Juntas and Cortès would not obey a prince in French captivity. And Ferdinand was at last set free without having any effect upon the Duke of Wellington and his Spanish force, who had entered France and taken up positions north of the Pyrenees.

Although advancing in connection with his allies into the heart of France, the Emperor of Austria did not abandon the hope of bringing his formidable son-in-law to such terms as Russia and England were bent on. Napoleon had not, indeed, accepted the conditions offered from Frankfort, and he remained ignorant of the immense change that his non-acceptance had wrought in the sentiments of his foes. He therefore sent Caulaincourt, Duke of Vicenza, his Minister of Foreign Affairs, to treat. This personage was not allowed to advance beyond the French outposts. And so, perceiving his enemies bent upon war, Napoleon left Paris on the 25th of January to meet them. His army extended from Troyes to Châlons. Schwarzenberg was at Langres, anxious to await negotiations; but Blücher,

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